HOW TO TAKE NOTES. 47 



With care in the arrangement and abbreviation of these points, all may be entered, 

 together with others not here specified. We have not yet fully determined upon the 

 best form for the Catalogue slip, and hope others will offer the results of their experience. 



For library and museum catalogues, the slips should be of heavier and stiffer paper 

 than for ordinary notes, and the surface should be well-sized, since ink is commonly 

 employed. 



100. References. The slips may be used for brief references to 

 works, papers, persons, addresses, localities, museums, etc., constituting, in 

 fact, permanent memoranda, which may be filed with more elaborate or 

 extended materials upon the same subjects. 



101. Extracts. Upon one side of the slip may be written from 40 to 

 50 words, either by hand, or with the type-writer when the lines are at 

 medium distance, 1 cm. apart. At short distance, the number is just 

 doubled, and, if necessary, both sides may be written on, or two or more slips 

 may be used, or a sheet may be used, and then folded to the slip size. 



102. Clippings. Clippings from periodicals and newspapers may 

 often be accommodated upon the slip. When no longer than the slip is 

 wide, they may be pasted at either end, with the lines always lengthwise of 

 the slip. When the length is greater than the width of the slip, the columns, 

 if narrow, may be pasted side by side ; but usually so much as exceeds the 

 width must be pasted on the remaining space so that the lines run across the 

 slip. By thus covering both sides, a single slip may receive an entire column 

 of "The Medical Record," or "Science;" more than half a column of 

 " The Nation," and nearly half a column of the " New York Daily Tribune." 



Even when unaccompanied by the signature of some well-established 

 authority, such clippings serve as memoranda which may aid in looking up 

 the matter farther, and as more or less valuable confirmatory evidence. 



103. Notes Proper. The most common and most important use of 

 the slips is as a ready and convenient vehicle for the many kinds of informa- 

 tion which the scientific or literary worker desires to record and to use. 



The Slip is Always at Hand. It may be written upon without 

 parade, and under almost any circumstances, whether sitting at the table, or 

 riding in the cars, or even on horseback ; whether engaged in regular 

 work, or conversing with friends, or even at night and in the darkness. 

 Under all these conditions, more or less favorable, the essence or "pith" of 

 a fact or idea may be recorded, though sometimes in a shape quite unintel- 

 ligible to others and well-nigh so to the writer, unless an early opportunity 

 is taken for putting it in better form. 



104. Accumulation and Elimination of Slips. -The beginner's 

 object is to accumulate the brief records of what he has learned, but is not 

 sure of remembering when wanted. 



After the first year, however, many of the things thus recorded become 

 familiar as the alphabet, and much also that is supposed true to-day may be 



